Eliyahu Crossing, Habla, Irtah (Sha’ar Efrayim), Ras ‘Atiya, Mon 28.12.09, Morning
Guests: Tali and Miriam (in preparation for an academic survey)
06.40 Habla
06.41 The gates opened a couple of minutes after we arrive, which means there is a line (albeit short) of Palestinians who have been waiting for the opening. There is a problem with the military computers, which causes a further 10-minute delay. After the problem is solved, things start moving.
07.10 Ras-a-Tiya
We are told that the gates were opened at 6.30. There are no lines.
07.30 Eliyahu crossing
There are no workers waiting, just a trickle of people walking behind the wire fence in the direction of the crossing from the direction on Qalqilya.
We go back the way we came and stop off at Irtah where, at 09.40, there is very little to see and the place is almost empty. We note the "welcome" signs by the road – how incongruous. We show our guests the facility – the efforts at gardening which are shielded from the Palestinians who use the place by enormous concrete blocks, and the overhead guards inside the facility who parade above with their weapons. One of our guests remarks on the similarity to a concentration camp. I tend to agree.
Eliyahu CP (109) / Crossing
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Eliyahu CP (109) / Crossing This checkpoint, also known as the Fruit Crossing, is one of the main checkpoints between Israel and the West Bank. It is located on Route 55 between Alfei Menashe and the turn to Qalqilya and Zufin, more than 4 km east of the Green Line, in the separation fence, which separates Qalqilya from its lands to the south, thus leaving Alfei Menashe West of the fence - the Seam Zone. This checkpoint, a few kilometers across the Green Line, is intended for "Israeli settlement in the West Bank and the population of the Seam Zone." It is managed by a civil company. Palestinians with a special permit for their lands in the seam area are also allowed to pass through it, on foot, and sometimes by car.
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Habla
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Habla CP (1393)
The Habla checkpoint (1393) was established on the lands of the residents of Qalqilya, on the short road that
connected it for centuries to the nearby town of Habla. The separation barrier intersects this road twice and cut off the residents of Qalqilya from their lands in the seam zone.(between the fence and the green line).
There is a passage under Road 55 that connects Qalqilya to the sabotage This agricultural barrier is used by the farmers and nursery owners established along Road 55 from the Green Line and on both sides of the kurkar road leading to the checkpoint.
This agricultural checkpoint serves the residents of Arab a-Ramadin al-Janoubi (detached from the West Bank), who pass through it to the West Bank and back to their homes. The opening hours (3 times a day) of this agricultural checkpoint are longer than usual, about an hour (recently shortened to 45 minutes), and are coordinated with the transportation hours of a-Ramadin children studying in the occupied in the West Bank.
Nina SebaAug-18-2025Habla: The gate is in the process of closing
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Irtah (Sha'ar Efrayim)
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The checkpoint is for Palestinians only. It is the main barrier to the passage of workers from the northern West Bank to Israel. Workers with a permit to work in Israel and also for trade (with appropriate permissions), medicine, and visiting prisoners. One can cross the checkpoint only on foot. The checkpoint is located north of Road 557 and south of Tulkarm. Operated by a civil security company, opening hours: between 4:00 and 19:00 on weekdays. As members of Machsom Watch, we began our shifts to this location in 2007. We arrived before it opened at 4 in the morning and report since, on the harsh conditions and the long and crowded queues of workers. The workers who pass by continue their journey by transportation to work throughout Israel. In the first period of its activity, about 3,000 and then 5,000 people passed through this checkpoint every day. Due to the small number of checking points and arbitrary delays for long periods of time in the "rooms", workers feared losing their transportation. Hence workers leave their homes at 2:30 at night to be among the first. Today, 15,000 pass and the transition is faster. Workers are still leaving their homes very early to get past the checkpoint at 7 p.m. In an adjacent compound, there is a terminal for the transfer of goods on a commercial scale, using the back-to-back method.
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Ras 'Atiya
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The checkpoint is presently on the Separation Barrier roadway, manned and open 12 hours a day, from 6:30 to 18:30. West of it is the large Seam Line village whose school is attended by children from the nearby villages east of the Barrier and many of whose inhabitants have permits to work in Israel. How long this checkpoint will remain in place is unknown, since construction of the Separation Wall, just by the settlement of Alfe Menashe, east of the present Separation Barrier, is endless, as is the creation of a new road and, obviously, a new checkpoint.
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